


What Must Be Done

by Nebulad



Series: Sataareth [13]
Category: Dragon Age (Video Games), Dragon Age: Inquisition
Genre: Angst, F/M, Mild Gore
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-10-20
Updated: 2016-10-20
Packaged: 2018-08-23 12:44:06
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,459
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8328454
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Nebulad/pseuds/Nebulad
Summary: He wasn’t sure if he should try to cover her eyes or something— when he’d lost his eye it’d all happened at once, with no anticipation. Tama could see the sword coming and her whole body was heating up like fire, but he’d keep a hold on her even if she burned him for it. “Don’t watch, kadan,” he advised, and she turned to look at him and… fuck. He hated the crying.“Stop,” she sobbed, her voice already raw from yelling.“I can’t.” He focused on trying to dig down deep to find those last vestiges from the Qun that would have no problem telling her no and sitting there silently while she panicked and begged for him to help her.





	

Iron Bull secured Tama back to chest against him, stretching her arm out flat and pinning the other one to her hip. It had to be done, but it didn’t stop him from feeling like a monster. Her Mark was eating her alive with every passing second and this was their last resort to stop it. Vivienne stood before him, grim faced and wane, with a small medical staff behind her and ready. With no experience in magic or actual physical healing, the only thing Bull could do was hold her still and it was making him sick. It was bad enough that she was shaking so hard that he had to stabilize her so she didn’t just fall on the ground, and not only did he have to drag her arm out while being able to _feel_ her trying to pull it back, trying to work her way out of his grip mumbling _stop, stop, katoh, stop, I’m not ready yet, please—_

...but she was crying too, and he hated it. He wasn’t supposed to be in this position, and neither was Vivienne. Neither of them were supposed to just sit there and watch while she begged them to stop, but they _had_ to, same as they had to tell Cole to leave the room because it was too much for him and they couldn’t be distracted. Solas was gone and he’d made it real fucking clear that he didn’t give a shit about Tama’s life, but _they did._

So it had to be done, but it didn’t stop him from hating himself a little when she started screaming. _Katoh_ meant he was supposed to stop but this time he _couldn’t_. It wasn’t the same context but he’d promised her that their word would always work and now he had to ignore her. He wasn’t sure if he should try to cover her eyes or something— when he’d lost his eye it’d all happened at once, with no anticipation. Tama could see the sword coming and her whole body was heating up like fire, but he’d keep a hold on her even if she burned him for it. “Don’t watch, _kadan,”_ he advised, and she turned to look at him and… fuck. He hated the crying.

“Stop,” she sobbed, her voice already raw from yelling.

“I can’t.” He focused on trying to dig down deep to find those last vestiges from the Qun that would have no problem telling her no and sitting there silently while she panicked and begged for him to help her.

“I’d rather die.” It was the fear talking, he knew; the fear of the cut, the fear of the blade… so he held her steady even as she realised he wasn’t gunna let her go and started physically writhing to try to get away. Cassandra held the sword, her face as set as she could make it— it was the sort of face he wouldn’t wanna see on the battlefield, because it wasn’t the sort to surrender. “Bull _please—”_

The blade swung.

Tama stiffened up and then blacked out, near as he could tell.

She quit moving so ideally she’d just blacked out.

Vivienne got to work in a swirl of cold blue healing, with the physical healers behind her scrambling to get everything in motion. They all worked in such perfect unity that he knew a handful of _sten_ who would kill for tips. Meanwhile, Bull’s breathing went funny because he was still holding her hand and all the gore and shit was just… there.

That is, until it dissolved into green light and popped out of existence.

Then he was just holding her, limp and sagging against his arm.

The room was kind of spinning weird but he had to hold it together long enough for them to do their emergency work and then get her up to the room they were going to keep her in. The planning hadn’t been so hard, although Bull getting physically ill was sort of a nasty surprise. Amputation in Thedas wasn’t so unusual, what with all the wars and demons and shit running around. It wasn’t anything Vivienne and her team hadn’t seen before.

Tama would be fine in the end.

“Where do I put her?” He even sounded nauseous, but his legs were still steady as he prepared to hoist himself up, trying to judge where her weight was gunna go. He also hadn’t thought she’d black out, although in retrospect he didn’t know why. Maybe he just figured she’d keep fighting him.

“Just a moment, dear,” Vivienne said, still working.

He’d kind of forgot where he was supposed to go next, all covered in her blood like he was and with the memory of her severed arm burned into his brain. He could still feel her limp hand and see the wound just— fuck. His fucking stomach was turning and he had to keep it together.

Cassandra sheathed the sword and her face didn’t relax although she turned on her heel and left, looking just about bloodless. Maybe she’d got a good eyeful of the wound none of them had ever wanted to see. It was different with bandits— cut a bandit open and it was fine because they were assholes and murderers and all sorts of nasty shit that you didn’t mind wiping out. Their wounds were immaterial.

When it was your own fucking heart getting her arm lopped off, it kind of threw you for a loop.

“All right Bull, pick her up and follow me. Support her arm, please.” Vivienne led the way and he was glad because his body had just enough left in it to do this one last thing and then… fuck, he didn’t know. Vivienne had the utmost practice keeping a steady nerve and calm demeanour in bad situations and even she was… a little unsteady. Her face still looked precision neutral, but her fists were clenched at her side as she moved— another one with a front row seat to what they’d had to do to Tama. “Krem will be waiting to take you outside while we work on the worst of it,” she added without looking, her voice sounding kinda distant. He wasn’t sure if it was his head making it sound that way or if the Iron Lady had let herself sound so gutted.

Next thing he knew Krem was ushering him out of the room and outside. He just sat his ass back in the grass, staring forward and trying to remember what exact rhythm he usually breathed in. He was sure that it was supposed to be automatic but that wasn’t really working at the moment, so he tried to get the beat going right.

“Did it go okay?” Krem asked, sitting down next to him.

“Yeah. Better than mine,” he returned. He could recognise it as a fact— it was a controlled environment, healers were standing by, everything went according to plan, no surprises complicated things— but he was having trouble… believing it.

“I sent a bird off to her parents. Varric’s writing Shokrakar too,” he reported.

“Good thinking.” Adaar was going to kill him. Adaar was going to haul his ass all the way to the Winter Palace and Adaar was going to tear him to pieces with his bare hands for letting his kid get hurt like that. Tamassran Sr. might be a bit more forgiving, but that would only be after Adaar burned his corpse and scattered his ashes into the woods where no one but demons would ever find him. Shokrakar would be so disappointed that she missed it.

“Guess we’re just waiting now, eh chief?” Stitches was with the healers that surrounded her sickbed, while Dalish and Skinner guarded the doors. Rocky and Grim were on rumour control, which… yeah. It just left him and Krem to wait for Vivienne to send someone. She’d promised that the moment the healers were finished she’d set him up a place where he could keep watch, and there was an uncomfortably large part of him that was sure that if he wasn’t there, something bad would happen. It was the sort of compulsive anxiety that you were supposed to report to your commander, but in lieu of that he’d just… told Vivienne and she’d promised him a place. Krem would be in charge in the meantime.

“Oughta go see where Cole ran off to,” he said, although he wasn’t sure if he could move just yet. As soon as he said it, the kid was sitting beside him with the same numb sort of horror that Bull felt, and then all the will to move just sort of… left him.

It was gunna be a long night.

**Author's Note:**

> [My writing blog is here](http://nebulaad.tumblr.com) and this took forever because school and also Saints Row.


End file.
